Enlistment
by INMH
Summary: In 1950, a few years after being discharged from the LAPD, Cole Phelps receives some visitors with a tempting offer.


Enlistment

**Rating:** PG-13/T

**Genre:** Drama/Hurt/Comfort

**Summary:** In 1950, a few years after being discharged from the LAPD, Cole Phelps receives some visitors with a tempting offer.

**Author's Note:** Oh God with school this took so long to put together but I DID IT.

**Disclaimer:** I do not own L.A. Noire or Captain America. They belong, respectively, to Rockstar Games/Team Bondi, and Marvel/Disney.

[-]

It had been a miserable, miserable two years.

_Almost three, _the wretched little voice in his head corrected nastily. _December's coming up fast._

Three. Right.

[-]

The knock at the door is unexpected, and Cole doesn't have any particular expectation of who might be on the other side of it. He does not recognize the woman on his doorstep- the man to her left, on the other hand, looks dimly familiar.

"Detective Phelps?" The woman inquires, and she's got an English accent. Cole feels the old curiosity stir, but it dies quickly.

"'Mister'." He corrects. "I'm retired."

[-]

Out the window, he can see that the grass is drying and the trees are losing their leaves. Winter is coming. It will be cold and unpleasant, because Crescent City is much further north than Los Angeles, so much further north that it's about a twenty-minute drive from the Oregon state border. In contrast, Los Angeles is some eleven hours away. That was on purpose: No temptation to go back and roam the streets. No chance to indulge the burning desire to drive by a house with children he was not allowed to see. No chance to hear the whispers and feel the glares burning into the back of his head.

For Cole, moving away from Los Angeles was not a good decision; it was his only choice, especially if he felt like retaining what little self-respect he had left.

And at this point, he was scraping the bottom of the barrel.

[-]

"Retired?" The man asks, eyebrows jumping up in surprise. It's not wrong, but it's not entirely right either, but either way it was a stupid thing to say because Cole's almost thirty and far, far below the age of retirement for non-injured veterans of the army and/or police-force.

The woman shoots the man a sharp look, but then turns back and smiles at Cole. And though it appears genuine, it is also business-like.

"Det- _Mr. _Phelps, my name is Peggy Carter, and this is Howard Stark. We'd like to talk to you about an… Employment opportunity."

[-]

Cole had been on his own, more or less, for the last three years.

He had broken up with Elsa, reading into the expressions she made and the words that hung unspoken between them and he had known that he was making her miserable with his melancholy. He cared for her too much to subject her to that.

He wasn't allowed to see his kids. Marie had gotten sole custody in the divorce, and he had not contested it; he wouldn't stand to see his daughters in the crossfire if someone decided to give him grief.

Most everyone else had cut ties with him. And without work to distract him, he was left to stew in his guilt and a growing sense of uselessness.

[-]

"Your performance with the LAPD, despite its… Less than pleasant ending-" Cole can't tell if she's judging him, or if she doesn't care and is hesitating out of a desire to be delicate. He'd be more surprised at the latter than the former. "-was exemplary. Your detective work was highly commended."

Cole kneads his knuckles and tries to keep his face unreadable. It's not too hard; he's so numb at this point he's not sure he could emote if he tried.

"You want me to be a detective in this… program?"

Carter nods. "Something like that."

[-]

He got a job in a convenience store.

After three years in the army and another two in the police force, a convenience store was a level of dull he was entirely unaccustomed to. Cole burned for the excitement of the LAPD, the good he felt when he investigated crimes and the _usefulness_ he felt when he did it successfully. He had been helping people, and he had been good at it.

But it didn't matter how good you were at your job when you were bad for the department's reputation. No, it didn't matter that Roy Earle was cozy with gangsters. It didn't matter that there had been cops that had taken bribes and planted evidence and let obvious criminals off without punishment or acknowledgement of their crimes (Cole still _burns_ over the Dahlia case, the one rotten thing that can still make him feel a strong level of disdain)- none of that matters so long as they don't get caught and reported to the press.

Cole was just an unlucky sonofabitch.

[-]

"Well, the gist of it is this," Stark leans forward, and this is the first time he's spoken since the door. He's let Carter do all the talking. "There are some… less than savory fellows who want to cause trouble for the country."

Cole raises an eyebrow at him. "Communists?"

"Nah- Well, possibly, but we're casting a much wider net than Communists or Fifth Columnists. Believe it or not, there are actually worse things in this country looking to screw us all over." Some might consider such an assertion shocking- the press and plenty of politicians are certainly milking the Communist threat for all it's worth. "Point is, Phelps, you've got a habit of seeing things others don't." Stark shrugs. "We need someone like that."

[-]

The idea that he would, most likely, never work in law-enforcement again was almost physically _painful _at first, and there was a sort of denial he developed over it. It couldn't possibly be the end- it wasn't possible that he would _never_ work as an officer of some sort again one day, that he would never investigate and solve another case.

But eventually the idea settled, and Cole accepted it with a grim hopelessness that became a common theme throughout his day-to-day routine. Reality was a bitch: He would never be an officer again, probably wouldn't see his daughters until they were grow up and didn't want anything to do with their two-timing father, and probably wouldn't have a relationship for at least a good, long while, until he could find a woman that could overlook the fact that he had cheated on his wife.

Cole forced himself to keep moving, to accept the way things were and move on.

If change was to come, it would not likely come soon.

[-]

It is almost too much.

_Work_, Cole thinks, desperately, kneading his hands a little harder. Actual, real, stimulating work, something that he hasn't seen since he was fired from the department. Something that sounded interesting. Solving mysteries, helping people- yes, yes, that was right up his alley.

But he has to make sure this isn't conditional.

"You know why I was fired from the LAPD?" He asks, somewhat warily.

Carter nods. "We are."

"And that's not… A problem?"

"Well, I wouldn't go _broadcasting_ it or anything," Stark says, rolling his eyes. "But we really don't give a damn who you did or did not get frisky with, Phelps. We care about your brain and what it's capable of."

Cole glances at Carter, who nods in agreement. "We are less interested in your past and more interested in what you are capable of doing in the future, Mr. Phelps. Are you interested in joining S.H.I.E.L.D?"

For the first time in a long time, Cole thinks he might cry.

"Yeah. I'm interested."

-End


End file.
